


tell me I'm fine and forget we’re dying

by Koryandr



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet, Eddie dies, Eddie's real sweet on Richie guys, IT Chapter Two Spoilers, M/M, Major character death - Freeform, Mostly Eddie reflecting on Richie, No happy ending here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-06
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2021-01-24 02:28:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21330751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Koryandr/pseuds/Koryandr
Summary: Eddie reflects on Richie in his final moments
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 5
Kudos: 44





	tell me I'm fine and forget we’re dying

**Author's Note:**

> So this was meant as a prelude to a fix-it I'll probably never finish, but It works well on it's own. First thing I've ever posted since ff.net like, a decade ago. 
> 
> -
> 
> Title: Finding You - Kesha

Richie is supposed to be smiles and laughter. He’s supposed to be annoying and cheeky and push all of your buttons until you feel like you’re going to explode. Richie is sunshine poking through the clouds and sunflowers blooming under overcast skies. Richie he doesn't wipe your tears but he pokes you in the cheek and tickles you until you can’t help but smile again. If you’re running away, Richie doesn’t stop you, he just grabs your hand and runs with you.

That’s how Richie loved though. Richie loved by making you laugh so hard your sides hurt. He loved by taking whatever upsetting thing was on your mind and, even just for a minute, making it an afterthought. He’d do it by pissing you off, or annoying you, or joking until you couldn’t help but smile. That’s how Richie Tozier loved. Maybe Eddie never appreciated it enough. Maybe he didn’t appreciate that Richie took his mother, someone that scared Eddie so much, and joked about her until Eddie would look at her and think of Richie’s jokes and not _ sickguiltfear _. He showed it by indulging Bill’s delusions that Georgie was still alive, he showed it by keeping spare clothes at his house for Bev when she was too afraid of her dad. Eddie didn’t appreciate it then. Maybe if he did, he would have noticed it more.

Richie isn’t supposed to be tense and _ scared _ and upset and it makes Eddie uncomfortable. Richie’s always the one that cuts their tension, that eases their frowns with anger or laughter, he’s the one that makes them feel better. 

Who is going to make Richie feel better?

Eddie can’t feel his fingers and doesn’t really know where his toes or his legs are, but he sees Richie, and Bill. Richie is there. He _ knows _ Richie’s hands are between his own, he can feel the tremors of Richie’s hands, can hear the quiver in his voice.

Richie’s acting like everything is okay, like Eddie’s lung isn’t completely collapsed, like he’s not very quickly bleeding out. Eddie knows he’s dying. And in the most absurd reaction, he just wants to laugh. He’s gone _ so long _ without feeling pain that the sudden explosion of it in his body is like a shot of adrenaline, a high he didn’t know he was chasing. Huh. He’s just remembering what it feels like to be alive as he’s dying. _ Isn’t it ironic. _

But Richie’s here, and Eddie has to leave him and he doesn’t want to, but he can’t change that. He looks at Richie and knows that now Eddie needs to be the one to cut the tension, to ease the tightness in his friends’ shoulders, to make everyone comfortable with the uncomfortable truth that he’s dying. He looks at Richie and thinks of all of the things he can’t put into words: the feelings that make his chest simultaneously tight and airy at the same time, the flutter of his stomach when Richie touched him or put a hand to his back as they walked. He remembers the childhood nostalgia of Richie’s freckles in the sun, of the way his prepubescent voice would crack around a dick joke, his lanky body curled up with Eddie’s.

There are so many things he wants to say, but he’s already drifting and he doesn’t know the right words for them. Love? That’s probably the right one. He loves all of them more than he thought was possible, but Richie is _ different _. Loving Richie is like fresh air after being dunked under water. Except nobody told Eddie he had been under the water for the last three decades, he didn’t know he needed fresh air, couldn’t remember what it felt like to breathe. He loves Richie, but surely Richie knows that.

Somehow the knowledge that Richie will cry when he dies hurts him more than the gaping hole in his chest. Has he ever seen Richie cry? He doesn’t want Richie to cry. Eddie’s the crybaby, not Richie. He wants to poke at Richie’s sides, and he wants to shove a foot in his face to get him to _ stop thinking so hard _. He loves Richie so much, he doesn’t want him to be sad, he wants Richie to laugh. Richie should laugh. Eddie wants to hear it again before-

“I fucked your mother.” He says.

Richie doesn’t laugh, but he smiles, and looks a little more fond than sad for a moment.

_ I’ll take it_. Eddie thinks to himself.

He can’t feel much, and he’s so cold, but Richie’s pushing against his chest. _ Good. Keep pressure on it _. Bill leaves his side and Pennywise is really big all of a sudden, but Eddie’s mind is so far from that all he can focus on is Richie’s hands between his own. There’s shouting, but Eddie’s heartbeat is a legato drumming in his ears drowning everything else out.

_ Suck the wound. _ Richie’s voice, a pitch higher and younger and lighter, says in his brain as he looks down at their blood-soaked hands keeping a futile pressure on his chest

“What, Eds?” Richie says, leaning in.

Oh. He said that out loud

“Suck the wound…” Eddie’s words are slurred, and he can’t even hold his head up anymore, his brain feels so light, where did it go? But he tries to do the stupid fucking British Guy: “Get in there.” He fucking giggles around blood-stained teeth. 

“Eddie.” Richie whispers, reverence in his tone. Eddie rolls his head over and oh, there’s Richie. Where was he before? Where was Eddie? Eddie tightens his grip on Richie’s hand. Well, he thinks he does, he doesn’t really understand left from down right now. He thinks Richie touches his face at one point, but that’s not right, he’s holding Eddie’s hands? Why isn’t he holding Eddie’s hands.

Eddie’s head lolls over to the side and he knows he’s seeing something important, and Richie is shouting, and oh Richie’s hands are so warm. With whatever he has left in him, Eddie brings his head back up to look at Richie. It’s not a bad way to go, looking at him. He can see the little boy in his curls, and the curve of his nose, his sharp cheekbones. Richie always had nice hands. He wishes he could hear Richie laugh again, could count the stupid freckles on his pale ass skin in the sun one more time. If he’s going to drift off, he just wants to curl up into Richie, feel his chest shaking with laughter, have Richie’s arms around him safe and warm. 

Eddie runs his eyes over the panes of Richie’s face one last time before his eyelids get too heavy to stay open. He lets himself relax, feeling the bone of Richie’s wrist, the crack of his knuckles and the dusting of hair there. If he relaxes enough, he can even hear Richie’s Voices, can hear Stan’s droll voice, and Bev’s tongue-in-cheek tone. He can smell the musky earth scent of Ben’s clubhouse, can see Mike’s kind eyes and the way the sunlight made Bill’s hair look almost red.

But it’s Richie’s _ laugh _, young and high, layering over this new Richie laugh that he never got the chance to love. That’s It. That’s what he wanted. If he’s going to die now, maybe it’s okay that that’s the last thing he gets to hear.

**Author's Note:**

> If anyone wants to cry with me, comments are open or feel free to message me at Koryandr on tumblr. Thank you to my love Annie (Annieapple24) for Beta-ing.


End file.
